


An unexpected visitor

by thatromanticweirdo



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Family, Father-Daughter Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-15
Packaged: 2021-03-13 09:08:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28775844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatromanticweirdo/pseuds/thatromanticweirdo
Summary: Set post-S7 (AU). Stacy turns up unexpected at the Cuddy-House residence..
Kudos: 10





	An unexpected visitor

**This one's been in my head for a while now, and the rest of our mocks got cancelled on Tuesday so I really had no excuse not to sit down and put pen to paper (fingers to keys?). I don't really know where this is set in a timeline sense. I guess it's a post-Bomshells AU where House never took Vicodin and Cuddy never broke up with him and here we are 3 years later.**

* * *

She knew she shouldn't. She'd been back to the hospital for 2 days to consult on a lawsuit that had been going on when she'd been there and made a point to avoid Greg, Lisa and James as much as possible, not wanting to run into her ex and have the breakdown of her marriage scrutinised. But before she left the hospital Stacy had, despite every ounce of willpower she possessed, asked the new consulting lawyer for the file of Gregory House.

He had a new address which surprised her, and she was even more confused now parked outside said address and it was an actual house on a suburban street. It had a well-kept garden and a cute path leading up to the front door. It crossed her mind that maybe she'd been given the wrong address, but she was there now, the lights were on so somebody was home, and if it was House's place he would definitely already have noticed her car outside. There was no way she could leave without him thinking her a coward.

So, she braced herself and got out of the car, walked up the path that led to the white front door and knocked twice, trying to sound confident and disguise her shaking hand. Of course, it was House so there was a good chance he was passed out either drunk or high somewhere. But when the door opened, it wasn't a grouchy old man carrying a cane that answered, but a little girl in pink and green striped pyjamas carrying a stuffed dog. The wrong house then.

"Hi sweetie, I think I'm at the wrong house, sorry," she leaned down and spoke in a gentle voice. Just then she heard another female voice calling down the hall sounding angry.

"Rachel Cuddy, how many times do I have to tell you not to open the door without me?" Cuddy marched down the hall into Stacy's view but didn't notice her at first, her glare fixed on the girl that could only be her daughter.

"Sorry mama," the girl whispered, retreating back inside behind her mother's leg. Cuddy placed a reassuring hand on the back of her head, clearly utterly obsessed with her daughter, despite her exasperation. Then she looked up, shocked at who she found at the door.

"Stacy? What on earth are you doing here?" she exclaimed, reaching out to hug her friend. Stacy returned the hug slightly uncomfortably, deciding to omit any mention of House from her explanation.

"I um, I was in the neighbourhood, helping the hospital on the case and I thought I'd pop by and see how you were. I see you have a daughter Lisa?"

"Yes, sorry, this is Rachel, can you say hello?" Cuddy smiled and asked her daughter, gently tugging on her hand.

"Hello," Rachel said, smiling shyly behind her fringe.

"Actually, that reminds me, didn't you tell daddy that you and doggy were going to help make dinner?"

Rachel nodded and ran back in the house towards the kitchen, trailing her dog behind her.

"You're married?" Stacy asked Cuddy, a mixture of surprise and delight written across her face.

"Last year," Cuddy nodded with a grin.

"Congratulations, I'm so happy for you!" Stacy exclaimed with genuine excitement

"Thank you," Cuddy smiled.

"How old is Rachel?"

"She's 4, I adopted her just after she was born."

"Wow. She looks just like you, I'd never have guessed," Stacy remarked.

"What can I say? It was meant to be," Cuddy shrugged with a smile, leaning against the doorframe.

"Does she get on well with your husband?"

"Wild horses couldn't keep them apart from each other," she grinned.

"Your house is beautiful, by the way," Stacy said.

"Thank you, I adore it, and it's close enough to the hospital that we're not too far away in case of a midnight emergency."

"Oh, is your husband a doctor as well?" Stacy inquired politely.

"He is," Cuddy looked uncomfortable and fiddled methodically with her wedding ring. Stacy felt a familiar pool of dread in the pit of her stomach but schooled her features into the polite persona she'd been maintaining. But of course, a familiar voice hollered from the kitchen.

"Cuddles? Middles and I were wondering if you might ever stop blabbering so that we could actually eat some dinner?" the yell was followed by a little girl's giggles and the sound of 3 impacts making their way down the hall. House appeared, cane in one hand and Rachel, clinging tightly to his neck, in the other. He stopped short as he noticed Stacy at the door, shock on his face evident and he glanced at his wife.

"I was just inviting Stacy in for dinner," Cuddy told House, ushering Stacy inside, not really giving her an option of saying no.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

"This way," Cuddy said, brushing past her shell-shocked husband and leading Stacy into the dining room. "How's Mark?" she asked, laying out another place setting and gesturing for Stacy to sit down at the table.

"We, um. We split up. Just after I left Princeton actually," Stacy said, unconsciously glancing to the doorway where House had Rachel perched on the kitchen counter next to him and was handing her handfuls of peas to throw into the risotto on the stove next to her. But what amazed Stacy the most was how gentle House was being with Rachel. Playfully tickling her but with one eye on the stove to ensure that there was no danger to the girl, and it was clear he wasn't doing it for Cuddy shaped brownie points, he was barely aware of the two women's existence. Stacy looked over at Cuddy who was staring with utter adoration at her family.

"How long have you and Greg been together," Stacy asked, unwilling to break Cuddy's gaze but desperate to fill the deafening silence that gave her time to realise what she'd walked away from.

"About two years?" Cuddy replied, snapping back into reality and sitting down next to her friend.

"Oh, so he wasn't with you when you adopted Rachel?"

"No. Although he was the first person to know I was adopting her, the first of my friends to hold her. Solved the case of her mother, although it was too late. But she's always been drawn to him, I don't really know why. He never wanted to be a part of her life, saw her as an obstacle I suppose," Cuddy shrugged, "but then one day we came in, I had to give him a file I think, and he was sitting on that god awful recliner throwing his tennis ball around and he threw it at me and it rolled to a stop at Rachel's feet and she picked it up and handed it back to him and said in her best two-year-old vocabulary 'Here you are Howse'. And for some reason, he threw it back to her, so gently, and from then on every time I turned around Rachel would be gone, off to find House and play catch," Cuddy smiled again, the same smile that appeared on her face whenever she glanced over at her husband and daughter.

"Was the transition from him just being 'House' to your boyfriend hard on her?"

"There was definitely a part of me dreading it, not just for her but for him as well. He'd stay the night sometimes of course and he adapted to the responsibilities pretty well, with a few minor hiccups" Cuddy smirked remembering the dime incident, "and she barely batted an eyelid. To be honest, I don't think she really remembers a time pre-House. But when he moved in, the transition from the boyfriend who's here sometimes and we see him sometimes but he can go home when it gets too much, or we can go home when it gets too much, to there's really no escaping him, was harder than I thought it was going to be - on all of us really. But Rachel, she just took it in her stride like she takes everything in her stride. There was one time when I really thought it was going to fall apart. Just once. House's leg flared up and Rachel was getting into trouble at school and we couldn't work out why and the hospital was looking like we were going to lose our biggest investor and I just didn't think we could keep it going. And then one day Rachel came to work after school, ran into my office and climbed on to House's lap and said 'Look what I did today at school daddy.' That's all she said. But she'd never called him dad before. I remember holding my breath and watching him, I don't think I blinked for an entire minute and I knew this was either going to be the end and he was going to walk away and say he couldn't do it, or he was going to embrace it and it was all going to be okay. And he looked down at her and said, 'Tell me everything Middles' and I knew, I just knew that we could do this. And it got better. And she had no idea that she'd saved us. She'd been getting in trouble at school because she didn't know whether to call him House or dad and she just kept shouting and on _the_ critical day she just decides to call him dad - one simple tiny word - and saves us. She's a miracle," Cuddy smiled softly at her daughter, wiping away the few tears that had escaped down her face.

Stacy smiled, knowing that House was right where he needed to be. "Thanks for inviting me to dinner Lisa but I really need to get going," she said, getting up from her seat and grabbing her coat from the back of her chair.

"No, please stay I insist," Cuddy replied, following her out into the hall.

"I have a long drive back Lisa and it's already late, thank you for having me but I honestly need to go," Stacy apologised, opening the door and retreating back into the cold night leaving a confused Cuddy standing in the doorway.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

"Stacy," a male voice called after her and she turned to see House hobbling down the path after her.

"Gregory House the family man, I have to admit I never thought I'd see the day," she quipped. "Happy looks good on you Greg," she smiled, though it pained her slightly.

"I'm sorry about Mark," he offered.

"It's okay," she replied with a shrug.

"You could stay for some food."

"No," she shook her head, "have dinner with your family Greg." He nodded, a silent understanding passing between them and he turned to head back in.

"Why Middles?" she called out after him, surprising even herself.

"She's the mini Cuddy," he replied with a grin and a shrug.

Stacy smiled as he returned back in, swinging the little girl who ran at him round and settling her on his hip and realised that however happy they could have been together, House was home with the Cuddys in a way he never was with her, and in a way that was a greater triumph than she ever expected it to be.

* * *

**Stay safe**

**\- A xx**


End file.
